Review: The Night is Found

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Backcover:

When they tried to kill a prince, they made a king

In the aftermath of his pack leader’s assassination Connor Lewis is ready to take control. Rodolfus de Aquila’s plan before he died was to unite the European werewolf packs against their common enemies: the Hounds of God who make the laws and enforce them ruthlessly with questionable motives, and the Luparii, an intergovernmental group of werewolf hunters now bent on the extermination of his kind. The uneasy alliance between these two factions has fallen apart, and now a battle wages leaving the pack werewolves scrambling to escape bio-chemical warfare on one side, and total domination on the other.

After hearing rumors of a union between the American packs Connor returns with Amara to his home city of New York to learn how to bring the Old World packs together. Werewolf society in the New World has taken a very different course from that of Europe, but when Connor meets the American leaders he begins to question if their ways are, in fact, the path forward.

A world away from Madison, Arden, and all those that he is trying to protect, Connor must discover the secret to uniting and leading the packs under one final charge, or else risk extinction for their entire species in the epic conclusion to The Magdeburg Trilogy.

I’m going to start this review by saying that the ending of The Night has Claws left me with two distinct feelings: the reader in me was desperate to get my hands on the final book in the trilogy ASAP – “You can’t leave me like this!”

The writer in me was worried on Kat Kruger’s behalf because it seemed like such a feat ahead of her to try and wrap up all the story lines in just ONE more book. Maybe the book would have to be like the last Potter and be triple the size of the first. <Spoiler alert – I asked this question of Kat for our Q&A and here is a bit of her answer >

“Since it’s the last book in the series I felt all of it had to be bigger, better, faster. Everything in the first two books had been working toward this point. At the same time there had to be So. Much. Closure. I was an emotional wreck by the end of it.” – Kat Kruger

Andruil: the blade that was broken

Coming out of Book 2 (my review of it is here btw), Aquila has been killed by a Lupari bullet that was aimed at Connor, leaving our young hero as the leader of the pack. Much like Aragorn in the Lord of the Rings trilogy, Connor has his crown thrust upon him and has to use this last book to grow into the man his pack needs him to be.

Book 3 picks up four months later with Connor reliving those last moments with Roul on-board the learjet his has inherited along with the responsibility to lead the packs.

Connor and Amara are on their way to America to learn what they can about the wolf packs there, hoping they can bring back that learning to extinguish the feud in Europe between the Hounds and the Luparii.

I have to say that if Kruger meant for me to really not like the Founders she did a great job of writing them as unlikeable. Esrin I am not supposed to like (and trust me, I do not) but even Marrock stayed on the unlikeable side of the scale to me. The American werewolves I LOVED though were the Wilds, especially Ben, who I think could make a cool central character for future books.

Meanwhile, Maddy forces her way onto Arden’s European road-trip, which allows for some much needed character development. For the longest time I felt like Maddy (and often Amara) were only in scenes where feelings and boyfriends were talked about, but in this last book, Maddy is all action, and I love it. We finally get to hear about Amara’s past, and it’s equally action-packed and awesome.

Look at this GORGEOUS cover!

Connor continues to evolve emotionally and really grows into the leader who was hinted at all the way back in The Night has Teeth, and it happens so gradually, and with such skill of pen, that you don’t even really notice until he stands up and takes confident control of scene after scene. The ending wraps everything up in terms of the war that has been going on between the werewolves in Europe, but it is the Epilogue that I know true Madgdeburg fans are going to relish. I’m not going to spoil it for you, but getting that little look at the happily-ever-after of your favourite characters is the sweetest thing. Thanks very much to Kat Kruger for opening this world up to us all and restoring this girl’s faith in the werewolf genre.